


chronic overthinker

by octolingkiera



Category: Over the Garden Wall (Cartoon & Comics)
Genre: Gen, POV Second Person, canon typical warnings apply, semi novelization, takes place during the last few episodes, wirt is the narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-29
Updated: 2020-10-29
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:15:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27263341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/octolingkiera/pseuds/octolingkiera
Summary: You are a chronic overthinker, but not about this.You wake up, and Greg is gone.You have to find him. You have to.
Relationships: Gregory & Wirt (Over the Garden Wall)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 25





	chronic overthinker

**Author's Note:**

> so i just rewatched otgw again and i just had to slam this out.
> 
> i started this bc i had the line "you are a chronic overthinker" floating around in my brain taking up A Lot of real estate and it wouldnt just buy a house so i have to give it a home

You are a chronic overthinker. You tend to hate that about yourself most of the time, but sometimes you don’t mind. Sometimes you’re able to work through a problem so quickly it’s like you never had one. Sometimes your thoughts swirl so fast that they refuse to settle and then the situation goes from bad to worse.

You’re a chronic overthinker, but not about this.

You wake up and your brother is gone. You wake up, Greg is gone, it’s snowing, and you can’t see him anywhere. You have no idea how long you’ve been asleep, but it must’ve been long enough because you’re forced to pull and rip and tear yourself out of the brittle vines that have wrapped their way around you.

You have to find him. You have to.

You take off running, yelling, searching, regretting. _This is my fault,_ you tell yourself. _What did I do?_ you ask yourself. _I need to fix this._

You slip. You fall. You get back up.

You think you can hear him, so you start running again.

The cold burns your throat, your nose, your eyes. Your fingers are stiff and your toes are numb. You keep going. You have to.

You break through the ice and fall into the freezing lake. The water is so cold your strength is sapped immediately. You want to struggle but everything is so, so heavy. Black hands reach across your vision and you sink.

 _Not again_ , you think. You don’t remember why.

You’re being pulled out of the water. You feel heavy, and tired, and so, so cold, but you try to stay awake. Greg needs you.

You hear a voice. Young? High? _Greg?_ You’re shivering, but only a little, and the part of you that’s always thinking knows that that’s a bad sign. The rest of you, however, tries to focus on the voice. You try to open your eyes but your vision is dark and blurry.

It’s Greg. It has to be.

You smile and choke out his name. You try to reach for him with arms you can barely feel.

The voice gets closer and you can finally see her staring down at you, worried, scared.

“Where’s Greg, Wirt?”

Your smile falls. “Beatrice…?” you say, just over a whisper.

The last thing you hear is her calling out for you.

You remember now. You remember the pining, the costume making, the football game, the party, the impromptu trip to the graveyard. You remember Greg and the tape and the candy and the rock. The panic, the terror, the complete mortification. Sara and Jason Funderberker and the rest. Climbing the wall, jumping over the wall, the train.

The falling.

You remember how you treated Greg then and there, how you still treated him here, in the beginning. How you disregarded him and blew him off and wanted nothing than more for him to go away and leave you alone. How you only tolerated him at first because of a sense of familial duty and not because you _really_ cared. How every time Greg would run off you would keep going, sure in the fact that he would catch up.

How could you be so cold? So callous? Greg is so little, so young, and you’re his older brother. He looks up to you, follows you, does what you say without question. He _trusted you_ , and you let him down, over and over again.

Greg is so much better than you.

You wake up and you are warm. Someone is humming, just to your left, next to your ear. It’s a pleasant sound and it chases away the cobwebs in your mind. You open your eyes and squint, taking in the sight of dozens of bluebirds nestled against you.

You just woke up and you’re confused. The last thing you remember is falling into the lake.

The humming stops and the bluebird speaks. Her voice is kind and she tries to feed you dirt. You mistake her for Beatrice and learn that this is her mother.

The frog is here. How did the frog get here? Where did he go? You learn you were both left on the doorstep.

“Beatrice…” She was there, you remember now. You saw her face, heard her voice. You thought she was Greg. She must still be looking for him. She’s out there in the storm, and if she’s out there, then so is Greg.

You have to go.

You convince the mother to let you leave and you reach down to take the frog into your arms. She wants you to wait, but you can’t. You have to go.

“You’ll be no good to your brother dead!” she tells you, though she makes no move to stop you. Maybe she knows it’s pointless. Maybe she can see the resolve in your eyes, the purpose in your movements, the regret and guilt in your heart.

You climb out of the tree.

“I was never any good for him alive, either.” You know that with certainty now.

You thank the birds for sharing their home, their warmth, their hospitality, and start off. The mother calls for you one last time, to ask you to give her daughter a hug, and you agree.

You’ll do as you’re told. You don’t know if you’ll even find her again. You hope you will. You have a lot to atone for.

You don’t know how long you’ve been trudging through the snowstorm. You can’t see more than a couple feet in front of you, if that, but you have to keep going. There’s no choice. You have to.

You’re grateful it’s not dark yet, but you know that’s going to change soon. The snow is losing its brightness by the minute and you can’t help but feel like it’s a metaphor. Symbolic. The sun is setting in your story and the light of hope is fading fast.

You press forward.

You hear a voice and you look up in time to see something come flying towards you, colliding first with you and then the ground. It’s Beatrice, and she’s seen Greg. “With someone,” she said, and you have a sick feeling you might know who it is.

She tries to point you in the right direction—how she can tell in this storm is anyone’s guess—but you try to ward her off, send her home to her family. They’re waiting for her.

“I can’t. Not yet. Not until… Greg is safe.” She looks you in the eye as she speaks.

You give her a searching look, just for a moment. “Okay,” you say. You won’t argue about this. She cares for Greg too.

You scoop her up and she points the way.

You press forward. You won’t give up.

The storm has calmed and it is dark.

You must’ve been walking for hours. It feels like it’s been days. You clutch your small companions against you and hope, pray, that you’ll be able to find your brother.

You start calling for him again now that your vision is rendered mostly useless. Beatrice begins to doubt herself, wondering if she’s pointed you in the wrong direction, when you see it. There’s a light in the distance, a warm glow.

You step forward and find the Woodsman’s lantern.

You shine the light around. The surrounding snow is displaced, violently, and you feel a pit in your stomach. All you can do for a few seconds is stare, motionless in your dread. Something awful happened here. You can’t remember ever seeing the Woodsman separated from his lantern, and yet here it was, laying abandoned in the snow. There was some kind of struggle.

_Beware the Beast._

Then you see him, nestled between curling boughs. The cold you feel has nothing to do with the weather.

“Greg!” You run to him, fearing the worst. “ _Greg_! Are you—?”

“Wirt?” His voice is small, croaky, frail. His skin is pale, sickly, cold. He looks so, so tired. He can barely open his eyes but he gives a small smile past the twisting branches of the Edelwood tree growing around him.

Your eyes burn and you smile back.

The look he gives you is so soft, so sweet. He’s so little. You’ve never quite noticed before how tiny he is, how delicate his features are, how big his eyes are. “Wirt! I did it! I beat the beast!” His voice grows in strength, just a bit, as some of his usual energy returns. He coughs up a few leaves and your heart stops for a moment before he admits to eating them.

Even like this, he remains himself. Bright, cheerful, a little silly. Devastatingly innocent.

You’re crying a little as he apologizes, and you him off claiming the fault for yourself. It’s all your fault the two of you are in this situation, you know it is. Everything is your fault. If only you’d listened. If only you’d stayed. If only you’d been a little kinder, a little stronger, a little more determined. If you weren’t such a coward, such a jerk, such a chronic overthinker. Maybe you could have gotten home sooner. Maybe you wouldn’t have come here at all.

He surprises you, again, as he always does, when he confesses to have stolen the painted rock like it was a tragic crime, as if the gravity of his theft is more important than the actual risk to his life here and now, wrapped in this horrible tree. You try to tell him it doesn’t matter. He matters more.

(The lantern is set in the snow.)

He asks you to return it for him, and you think that maybe, once again, you haven’t given him enough credit. “No, you can give it to her yourself,” you tell him, sharper than you meant. You gently push his hand down and lift the frog. Your heart in your throat, you say, “We gotta get,” a split second hesitation, “Jason Funderburker home.” You manage to crack a smile. “Right?”

Greg’s little eyes light up. It warms you, briefly. “Jason Funderburker!” He smiles back, bigger and brighter than before. “The perfect…” he sags a bit, expression drooping, “frog name…”

And then he’s out.

You can’t move. You’re frozen. Your stomach drops, your heart stops, and you forget to breathe, for just a moment. You call for him. Once. Twice. Fire runs through your veins, burning cold, and you want to reach out for him but you’re so, so scared. Your thoughts grind to a halt.

You’re a chronic overthinker, but not about this.

Beatrice, thankfully, takes charge. She starts pulling on a branch, tells you to do the same. Your eyes are wet and your vision blurs, but you hear yourself agree.

You grab hold and start to pull, but the Edelwood is strong. You pull and pull and pull but it refuses to move. You want to scream. You want to cry. You want to beg and plead and pray, but.

But.

There’s a noise behind you.

You turn to face it, bringing the lantern with you for light. There, collapsed in the snow, is the Woodsman, looking worse for wear.

Beyond him, the Beast.

“Give me my lantern,” it says, voice deep and chilling. It seers your bones, sinks into your teeth, thrums through your veins. The voice is ancient, powerful. The voice of the forest, twisted, warped, dangerous. You want to cower, to run, to hide. You do none of those.

Then the words register. “ _Your_ lantern?” You look at the lantern, then the Woodsman.

“No way. We need this thing,” Beatrice says, more confident than you.

“Yeah, I’m keeping this,” you say, bringing it closer to you. If the Beast considers it valuable, you shouldn’t let the Beast get a hold of it. “I have to get Greg home.” You have to. You have to, even if it’s the last thing you do. Greg is so much better than you.

“Your brother is too weak to go home.” The Beast gives the impression of a careless shrug. “He will soon become part of my forest.” The voice curls around the words, possessive.

A chill runs down your spine. “I won’t let that happen.” You put as much vitriol into your voice as you can muster.

“Well then,” it purrs, a formless black shadow shifting, “perhaps we’d better make a deal.”

You pause. Your head tilts. “Deal?”

The Woodsman stirs.

“I can put his spirit in the lantern.” The Beast’s white eyes grow larger and a black hand reaches forward. “As long as the flame stays lit—” you lift the lantern and look into its warm glow, “—he will live on inside.”

You turn to look at Greg. Your mind races, thinking, overthinking, circling back and forth. You look back to the Beast as it begins to speak again.

“Take on the task of Lantern-Bearer, or watch your brother perish.”

You take a deep breath, and think, brows furrowed. At your side, Beatrice is silent. You consider the Beast’s words, the task it’s proposing, and you think about the Woodsman, he warnings and tales. You think about your journey, what you’ve done and where you’ve been, and you think about how you would have done things differently. How you _could’ve_ done things differently.

You wonder what Greg would have done if you hadn’t been there to drag him down.

Greg has always been so much better than you.

“Come here,” the Beast beckons.

You grimace, sigh, and concede. “Okay.”

“Wirt!” Beatrice hisses as you step past her.

You approach the Beast, lantern in hand. You can live with this choice, you think. You can live with this burden as long as Greg gets out alive. You think you could be okay with it.

You set the lantern down. The train of thought that’s been wilding chugging through your mind finally pulls into a station.

_…But._

“Wait,” you say, coming to a realization. You lift the lantern and take one, two steps back. “That’s dumb.”

Why should you have to? Greg wouldn’t be happy to leave you behind. He wouldn’t want you to do this. He would want you to come with him, he would want you to escape. He had been willing to give himself up for you to leave.

You’re learning, slowly, to give him more credit.

_If Greg can beat the Beast, then so can I._

Maybe you can give yourself a bit more credit as well.

“ _What?_ ” the Beast hisses, growls, demands.

“That’s dumb,” you repeat, expression hard. “I’m not just gonna wander around in the woods for the rest of my life.”

“I’m _trying_ to _help_ you.” The voice gets deeper, darker. More menacing. It sends a jolt through your nerves, but you steel yourself.

“You’re not trying to help _me_. You just have some weird obsession with keeping this lantern lit. It’s almost like,” you look at it, gesture to it, thinking out loud, “ _your_ soul is in this lantern.”

The Woodsman gasps.

The Beast jerks, rocks, shakes, quivers. It moves like a fluid, makes a sound like a wild animal set to devour its prey, and it stretches, squashes, expands and compresses. It pulls the ambient light from the surrounding area and condenses it to the lantern. It’s no longer a warm glow but a cold flame.

You’re glued to the ground, petrified, terrified, and you pull the lantern closer. You feel like you’ve made a horrible mistake.

 **“Are you ready to see true darkness?”** The Beast stares at you with technicolor eyes, watching, waiting.

It makes no other move.

You furrow your brow, and you think. The Beast continues to stare, its gaze boring into you like hot knives. You bite your lip, and you take a chance. “Are yo—” Your voice cracks, embarrassingly, but you clear your throat and recover quickly. You level a stare of your own at the Beast, gaining confidence the longer it does nothing to stop you. You open the little door on the lantern’s window and ask,” Are _you?_ ” You suck in a loud breath and move to blow out the flame.

For the first time, you can see the Beast panic. “Don’t! Don’t—!” it shouts, the light returning to the world. It falls back several paces, an arm outstretched in your direction. Its voice doesn’t cut as deep this time, and you can’t help but feel accomplished.

You close the lantern and huff, schooling your expression into cool disinterest.

The Woodsman is letting out a shuddering breath as you approach. “Here, Woodsman,” you say, offering him the lantern. “I’ve got my own problems to take care of.” You pass it off. “This one’s yours.” You step back and reach for his discarded axe. “My brother and I are going home.”

You take the axe and start chopping, gently, to free your brother. A few decisive cuts later, you hoist him onto your back and scoop the frog into your arms. Once Greg is settled, you look at Beatrice.

“Wirt—”

“Come with us,” you say, cutting her off.

“I…” she pauses, considers, just a moment. “I gotta go home, too. Admit to my family it’s my fault they’re bluebirds.” She turns her eyes away, ashamed of her past actions, and you remember something else.

You shift your load just a bit and reach into your pocket, pulling out the golden stork scissors you took from Adelaide’s house. You clear your throat and hold them out, a peace offering long in the making.

“What?” she squawks, more humanlike than birdlike.

“The scissors,” you say, confirming aloud what you hold in your hand, “that’ll make your family human again.”

“You had them all along?” she asks, sounding just a little upset.

“Well I,” you tilt your head a bit, “used them to escape Adelaide and then… Yeah! I-I, was, sorta mad at you.” It feels childish to admit it, but you feel better for it.

“Oh, you,” a tear trails down her cheek and she swoops in for a bird hug, “wonderful mistake of nature!” You smile. The Wirt you were at the beginning of your journey would’ve taken that the wrong way, but. You’re trying to be better than you were before. You _are_ better than you were before.

She pulls away and takes to the air, holding the scissors with her feet. You exchange nods and start off into the darkness.

Greg’s breathing by your ear is shallow but steady. The frog in your arms is cold but alive. You’re a little banged up and bruised, but you’re still going.

You’re going to get home. All of you. You have to.

_“Goodbye, Beatrice.”_

_“Goodbye, Wirt.”_

**Author's Note:**

> hope you like it :3
> 
> kudos and comments are much appreciated
> 
> [check me out on tumblr!](https://octolingkiera.tumblr.com/)


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